Dry Top farming
In general it doesn’t matter if an end game zone has good or bad loot, it only matters if it is the best. Best for dragonite, best for gold, best for crafting, but it has to be best for something. The game cannot support many end game zones as the players will always go to the one they see as the best and the others will be empty.
Dry Top is quite well designed however and there are plenty of reasons to go back for keys, dailies, achievements, and story. There’s nothing to stop guilds from organizing weekly runs in Dry Top in the same way as guild missions.
I think people are probably a little burned out on Dry Top. Farming geodes week after week doing the same events over and over again got old for me even though the rewards where pretty good and it’s the best way to farm dragonite.
In my experience, it is because of its inconsistencies. Most of the time, players are not motivated to do the event thus Tier 3 is common, then back to Tier 1.
To be honest, after doing the same event 2-3 times gets old really fast, so to do them 4-5 times to get to Tier 4 and 5 is mind numbing.
And then, at the end of the day, after spending all that time, I look at my pack only to be disappointed.
So after a couple of weeks, I’m done with it. I mean building the growing back pack is cool and all, but I already have my favorites.
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Full set of 5 unique skills for both dual-wield weapon sets: P/P and D/D – Make it happen
PvE – DD/CS/AC – If that didn’t work, roll a Reaper or Revenant.
I can agree on the burned out thing. I have found my crystal insects. Stacked up on geodes. Purchased the recipes. Killed the mobs and found the coins. Done the story journal. Now waiting for the update to continue forward into the Maguuma wastes.
Dry Top has been dead for the past few weeks. It used to be relatively easy to get onto a map where you could push it to T6, but I haven’t seen T6 in about two weeks now, and even barely-T5 maps are extremely rare. I really enjoy Dry Top, but I don’t like wasting my time putting 100% effort in for 40 minutes, knowing that the best I could achieve for that is T5, while I could get onto a T4 map just by showing up at XX:40. It’s not worth the hassle.
As I’ve suggested elsewhere, I think they should cut out the third round of pre-storm events (the XX:30 ones) and push the first round back to XX:10, leaving a ten minute gap at the beginning to wrap up bosses and organize before the first race (and of course rebalancing the favor needed so that it requires less in total since there would be less total events).
Ideally the favor requirements would also be smarter, for example if events aren’t being done at all, then you shouldn’t need those events to reach T6, it should scale to the participation level of the map you’re on, so that if players are kicking butt on their own events, but that some are simply not happening, it would still work out. There’s been a certain elitist element that tends to respond something about having to “earn” T6, but this is a game, it’s meant to be fun, and giving your best but still falling well short of the max rewards is just not fun.
“If you spent as much time working on [some task] as
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
I like the area for the looks, but not for navigating. As such I choose not to frequent the map too often.
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“Who’s Ted?”- “Ted’s dead, baby. Ted’s dead.”
I’d agree that it’s burnout. Dry Top is an amazing farming place, but there’s only so many rotations of Mites > Haze > Queen > Mites > Haze > Twister > Skritt > maybe Giant? and so many Geodes you can farm before you need a break. And as Ohoni says, without a certain critical mass of players, it’s quite hard to get to T5 or T6, and it can be quite demoralizing when attempts to get there fail time and time again. That leads to players leaving, which just creates a vicious cycle.
The initial mechanics worked great when player interest was high, but now that interest is fading, perhaps the events and the sandstorm need some tweaking so that it’s still doable by lower numbers of players.
I can agree on the burned out thing. I have found my crystal insects. Stacked up on geodes. Purchased the recipes. Killed the mobs and found the coins. Done the story journal. Now waiting for the update to continue forward into the Maguuma wastes.
This so very much this. Hopefully the next area revealed will be a bit more substantial (and varied, although since it’s still part of the same zone I’m feeling somewhat doubtful. I expect a lot more sand).
I would still happily do 2-3 hours of Drytop per night if I could be guaranteed a T6 capable map each time. ANet needs to do something able scaling so that whatever map you end up on, whoever happens to be on there, you can get T6 on it if you try.
“If you spent as much time working on [some task] as
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
I thought the megaserver system was supposed to take care of the empty map issue.
The Dry Top maps people are getting to aren’t empty, but that doesn’t mean everyone on the map is trying to put in the time and effort to get the zone to T6. Some people might just be running to story instances, others might be there to use lockpicks, people going in and out to get recipes or clay for Mawdrey or whatever else.
So if there’s two hundred players actively looking to get a T6 Dry Top map, but they’re split up between six different instances along with two hundred players just doing other random things..
Dry Top is just impossible tonight. The map I’m on has no clue, and I have no way to get to any other ones because you can’t just map-transfer at will. Now there are new Ambrite weapon collections and I still need recipes for about half of them, but I can’t imagine ever making that happen with the current maps. They need to totally scrap the Favor of the Zephyrites and fix it to be manageable with realistic map populations.
“If you spent as much time working on [some task] as
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
I was reading a topic on reddit this morning and I was wondering: why are people not farming at Dry Top?
I’ve been away for a month so i farmed there just 3 times, but i don’t think the loot is bad.
because its awful and rewards are even more awful. If you got more geodes or the stuff form the chests dropped more, it would be worth it. As of now its awful for the time put in.
I was reading a topic on reddit this morning and I was wondering: why are people not farming at Dry Top?
I’ve been away for a month so i farmed there just 3 times, but i don’t think the loot is bad.
because its awful and rewards are even more awful. If you got more geodes or the stuff form the chests dropped more, it would be worth it. As of now its awful for the time put in.
Yeah, this guy is right. Don’t farm Dry Top. It only gives you (in an organized fashion) 20-25g / hour, so don’t do it! lolwhat
Some of these reports seem very strange to me, since I haven’t been in anything less than a t4 drytop for weeks. I assume it’s something to do with the way Megaservers are grouping people? I’ve never seen anything higher than t4, personally, but I don’t really care for the grind after that or see much need to make myself miserable to go beyond it, so I don’t mind.
Monetary rewards are relatively worthless… I think I probably lose money from all the porting around I do. However, I also appreciate that they’re trying to raise the value of alternative currencies like Geodes. I told myself at first I was just going to farm for geodes to buy Mawdrey mats. That seemed quick at first until I realized how repetitive the mats are for each level up to Mawdrey. Now I’ve got all my geode-bought mats but I’ve also found 3 more fossilized insects that I need to buy recipes for. That’s 1,200 geodes I get to grind out in the future, plus 2 inscriptions for my non-huntsman crafters, which ensures I’ll be coming back to Dry Top for quick “I don’t have time to do a dungeon” spells for a loooong time in the future.
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I actually like farming Dry Top. Lots of great spots for T6 mats. I don’t go to farm Geodes, but if I am near an event I’ll do it. I didn’t much care the the Favor Tiers, haven’t found anything I really wanted there, but the mat drops are pretty decent.
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Yeah, this guy is right. Don’t farm Dry Top. It only gives you (in an organized fashion) 20-25g / hour, so don’t do it! lolwhat
I do Dry Top a lot, but I’m just curious, in what way are you making 20-25g per hour? Is that just from running the standard events, or it is ignoring Favor and just farming certain mobs, how much does it involve creative selling? I mean, I’ll make at least a few gold off of doing the standard event chains, but never that much (although who knows what mats I might be picking up).
Some of these reports seem very strange to me, since I haven’t been in anything less than a t4 drytop for weeks. I
T4s have been fairly common for me too. Occasionally I’ll pop in mid-sandstorm to see what’s up, and often just stumble into a T4. T5s aren’t super uncommon either, you just need to use LFG (they died off just after the patch, but have picked up a little bit). T5 maps still aren’t nearly as common as they were when they were fresh.
T6 I haven’t seen in about a month though. I’ve heard some people have hit them, but they aren’t common, even when we’re relatively organized and trying.
“If you spent as much time working on [some task] as
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
Yeah, this guy is right. Don’t farm Dry Top. It only gives you (in an organized fashion) 20-25g / hour, so don’t do it! lolwhat
I do Dry Top a lot, but I’m just curious, in what way are you making 20-25g per hour? Is that just from running the standard events, or it is ignoring Favor and just farming certain mobs, how much does it involve creative selling? I mean, I’ll make at least a few gold off of doing the standard event chains, but never that much (although who knows what mats I might be picking up).
Hey, yeah sure, here is a breakdown, but before I begin let me say it’s t6 im talking about. I read in your other comments that you are having difficulty getting into t6 and you are from NA. We on EU have at least 1xt6 every 2 days. With that said:
Non-sandstorm:
On an avarage route you get 4 events in a 15 min cycle. That means you get a total of 10-11 events during the non-sandstorm phase. Because you get tier+1 geodes for every event, and later tiers are slower to get you’ll get around 40 geodes for this phase.
Sandstorm:
On t6 every event is worth 14 geodes. You should be able to do tons of events: Mites -> North mine -> Haze -> Skritt Burglar -> Devourer Queen-> Giant -> Mites -> North mine -> Haze -> Tornado -> Skritt Queen -> Giant Beetle. That’s 12 events. Even if you miss the North mine it’s 10. So that’s 140 geodes minimum (if you have some leecher blood in you, you can even get the Skritt events and Chikenado, so it’s possible to do 17 events). But let’s stick with 10.
So you got a total of 180 geodes. From th sand you gathered (250+) you’ll get around 5 more, plus maybe some keys. So you got 185.
On tier6 a brick of clay is 4 geodes, so you can get 2 full clay pots. Last time I checked that was still worth 9,5 g.
So that’s 2×9,5g – the ecto + the champ bags and other loot ~ 20 g.
The bonus depends on the champ bags. If you are doing Tootsie round you’ll get around… 12 bags, if other rounds you’ll get around 10.
Edit:
Checked Clay pot price – at the time this was posted, it’s still 9,5g.
(edited by Bubi.7942)
Hey, yeah sure, here is a breakdown, but before I begin let me say it’s t6 im talking about. I read in your other comments that you are having difficulty getting into t6 and you are from NA. We on EU have at least 1xt6 every 2 days. With that said:
Thanks. Ok, fair point. Yeah, even T5 is impossible on NA most nights (if it is happening it’s VERY under the radar), but we’re trying to organize some T6 attempts on weekends. I really miss the heyday though, when there were like 2-3 T5 maps at any given time, at least one or two of which would hit T6 most of the time.
On t6 every event is worth 14 geodes. You should be able to do tons of events: Mites -> North mine -> Haze -> Skritt Burglar -> Devourer Queen-> Giant -> Mites -> North mine -> Haze -> Tornado -> Skritt Queen -> Giant Beetle. That’s 12 events.
Ok, on NA maps there usually isn’t time to get mites, haze AND mine, so mine is often skipped, and Giant Beetle and Giant are almost never cleared, so that’s two out, but chickenado is usually doable (bare in mind, when we were regularly getting T6s, we could at least manage Giant, but in the modern meta, it’s just not possible to fit in).
And ok, so your method of converting time into money is to make clay pots, year, that works out. It’s not exactly pure profit, you’re looking at 5.8g each after costs and fees, but it’s not bad.
Might be worth using keys to open chests instead though. For the time being, Twister in a Jar goes for a reasonable ~3.5g each, and I tend to get 1-2 of those per ten keys or so, along with the champ bags and other junk you get, I haven’t run the math but it might be about the same.
Currently though I’m just trying to complete my Ambrite collection. I’ve got about 60% of them now, and plenty of bugs for it, I just need the rest of the recipes.
“If you spent as much time working on [some task] as
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
Giant is tricky cause people don’t believe it can be slain quick, cause lots tried with few people. Truth is, it doesn’t scale at all, so the more people you have, the faster it will fall.
If you can get the map to go for it, you can get it under 1 minute (best I’ve seen was 40 seconds) and that’s 3 champ bags + 1 rare + 1 event.
As for the Pot, price of ecto is (43 silver) + the dust + thermoagent is 2,5 g alltogether. So it’s 7 g pure profit on each Pot. But the champ bag mats usually pay for the ‘loss’.
Giant is tricky cause people don’t believe it can be slain quick, cause lots tried with few people. Truth is, it doesn’t scale at all, so the more people you have, the faster it will fall.
Yeah, and on a high pop, organized T6 map you can complete it easily enough, but with the apathetic T4 maps we’re mostly stuck with on NA it’s typically hard to mobilize more than like 20 people or so at a time, and even Skritt Queen can fail sometimes.
“If you spent as much time working on [some task] as
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
you spend complaining about it on the forums, you’d be
done by now.”
Yeah, this guy is right. Don’t farm Dry Top. It only gives you (in an organized fashion) 20-25g / hour, so don’t do it! lolwhat
I do Dry Top a lot, but I’m just curious, in what way are you making 20-25g per hour? Is that just from running the standard events, or it is ignoring Favor and just farming certain mobs, how much does it involve creative selling? I mean, I’ll make at least a few gold off of doing the standard event chains, but never that much (although who knows what mats I might be picking up).
Hey, yeah sure, here is a breakdown, but before I begin let me say it’s t6 im talking about. I read in your other comments that you are having difficulty getting into t6 and you are from NA. We on EU have at least 1xt6 every 2 days. With that said:
Non-sandstorm:
On an avarage route you get 4 events in a 15 min cycle. That means you get a total of 10-11 events during the non-sandstorm phase. Because you get tier+1 geodes for every event, and later tiers are slower to get you’ll get around 40 geodes for this phase.
Sandstorm:
On t6 every event is worth 14 geodes. You should be able to do tons of events: Mites -> North mine -> Haze -> Skritt Burglar -> Devourer Queen-> Giant -> Mites -> North mine -> Haze -> Tornado -> Skritt Queen -> Giant Beetle. That’s 12 events. Even if you miss the North mine it’s 10. So that’s 140 geodes minimum (if you have some leecher blood in you, you can even get the Skritt events and Chikenado, so it’s possible to do 17 events). But let’s stick with 10.
So you got a total of 180 geodes. From th sand you gathered (250+) you’ll get around 5 more, plus maybe some keys. So you got 185.
On tier6 a brick of clay is 4 geodes, so you can get 2 full clay pots. Last time I checked that was still worth 9,5 g.
So that’s 2×9,5g – the ecto + the champ bags and other loot ~ 20 g.
The bonus depends on the champ bags. If you are doing Tootsie round you’ll get around… 12 bags, if other rounds you’ll get around 10.
Edit:
Checked Clay pot price – at the time this was posted, it’s still 9,5g.
Oh man, I got all excited at the prospect of 20g per hour because I actually very much enjoy Dry Top, but… I still need geodes for ambrite recipes. 3 more at least. So I guess I won’t be rolling in dough any time soon. And now my geode farming for said recipes is further soured by the fact that I’m losing (potential) money for it. As if the grind itself wasn’t bad enough.
I overlooked the clay pot selling. I wish I was still overlooking it >.>
Yeah, doing the recipes myself, only 4 left thankfully (and 3 more fossils needed).